LCD Soundsystem - American Dream - 9/1/17

Not as much as I love Oh Baby. Had it on repeat the last half hour. God, it's great.

I was talking about the album lol. there are 2 songs that straight rip Born Under Punches & The Great Curve

It's funny that there's a Cure ripoff on this album and it's not the song literally called "other voices"

I Used To is the obvious Cure one but the vocals in Tonite from 3:50 really remind me of Disintegration

I think this is a much better final album than the last one. They should break up again.

I think this is a much better final album than the last one. They should break up again.

― Josh in Chicago,

Nah. This album at worst does nothing to advance the plot, but it does nothing to weaken the band's otherwise pretty solid catalog.

I'd be cool with them breaking up again, though.

How Do You Sleep = Someone Not Great

This album and pretty much everything by LCD = something.

dull and bad as usual. maybe the second half will pick up?

we should have precovered this too

'i used to' slightly less dull and bad than most of their songs tbf

these posts still allow for them not usually being very dull and bad

he is almost the perfect hipster milquetoast. he's pathologically incapable of having an interesting idea. sometimes he executes an uninteresting idea well

idk, LCD definitely has tracks. Debuting your band with "Losing My Edge" was brilliant. "Someone Great" is a beautiful song. "Dance Yrself Clean" is great but overplayed for me.

all of those, especially someone great, are boring ideas executed well

what ideas are you talking about? the melodies, the arrangement, the voices used in the composition?

or whatever the song is an homage/pastiche of? bc that's one that I don't hear anything obvious in - feels very original

melody, arrangement, structure etc

someone great is especially well-done, is what I meant. and its bendy synth line is a really good boring idea

Why is a bendy synth a boring idea? Please explain objectively.

if a "boring idea" turns out to be a good song you might have to concede it was not in fact a bad idea

xxp we are too frequently satisfied having our pre-chorus before our chorus and it is booooooring

you know it's kind of strange that SoS's two best songs are nakedly earnest and autobiographical while the rest of the album is "It's TIME to get away-uhh"

if a "boring idea" turns out to be a good song you might have to concede it was not in fact a bad idea

― a serious and fascinating fartist (Simon H.), Friday, September 1, 2017 8:17 PM (twenty minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

it wasn't a BAD idea! sometimes boring ideas are good ideas idk. it's a song i'm happy that exists, and i'm also happy to never hear ever

the bendy synth line in it is probably his best idea ever, but you'll have to convince me it's in any way interesting

i'm being harsh of course but every time i hear this band i just hear someone playing it almost aggressively safe, every time

I dunno, I think they play it safely LCD Soundsystem, but I can think of ways they could be "safer." Shorter songs, attempts to be funky rather than hypnotic ...

Personally, I would love to see/hear/read a piece where huge LCD fans hear the Talking Heads, Eno, Berlin Bowie or Joy Division for the first time.

vintage throwback lj here

He's never ever seemed interested in creating new sounds or genres, but in creating a world out of his favorite records/reference/vintage gear etc.

that seems fair

this record would be better if it wasn't an lcd soundsystem record

not because it matters what the band is called but because i think they would have made more interesting decisions about how to present these ideas if they were facing down the prospect of having to tour it without being able to lean on the old songs to make the shows good

the engine driving the old records was a dude who on paper was not supposed to be perceived as relevant daring to make relevant music

this is the inverse, it's someone who on paper is relevant by default daring to make a record that just absolutely isn't relevant

i'm sure there are good ideas here because he has had a lot of them and i doubt he stopped having them suddenly

i just don't enjoy listening to this enough to ever find them

I think that's very fair and gets into what makes this "safe." You can see the wires attached in case something goes wrong and they fall.

JM is the voltron of the killer record store nearby where he grew up

http://www.prex.com/

other voices, as an evolution of pow pow with crosseyed and painless chorus grafted on, seems most guilty, but i still have time for it. so safe is a fair criticism of some tracks in so far as it's relative to their previous work. the album still feels like it has some new territory for them somehow. the increment is maybe smaller this time. breaking up and reuniting probably doesn't help my perception of that increment. i'm still enjoying this v much.

call me stephensufjan stills

ok. third time through and maybe there's more TH on here than just one droopy crosseyed and painless chorus, lol

There's a 12 minute tribute to David Bowie on here, which goes completely instrumental for the last five minutes. The idea that this is 'safe' says more about how many things LCD has tried throughout their career than how little they try here.

have not read this thread yet but played this album today. i think this is much better, on first listen, then the last record. i'm glad they came back and made more music.

This is a really good album, much to my surprise and delight! I hadn't loved any tracks that were shared individually but everything makes sense, sonically, when you hear it as a whole.

Posts about the boringness of the ideas, or how boring ideas are manifested in this record on this thread seem like intellectual posturing, imo. I've seen an English person post about such and such being "milquetoast" - to use that phrase, I mean, come on, get over yourself/selves.

But I do think that there's something unsavoury about swooping in to a thread on an album that's a day old to tell everyone how boring it is - and the reason I know that is because I've do t it myself many years ago.

(Apologies, phone post)

i like Other Voices and Change Yr Mind but they really do just sound like Remain In Light tracks with at least one layer of guitars missing, which is disappointing because usually he's better at coming up with some sort of interesting synthesis of references etc

the only duds on this album are Emotional Haircut and Black Screen

first part otm. Second part is madness. maybe.

Posts about the boringness of the ideas, or how boring ideas are manifested in this record on this thread seem like intellectual posturing
otm

you can normalize
don't it make you feel alive?

lcd soundystem is best when the songs don’t have ideas

i enjoy this record a lot and i enjoy imago but he hasn't said why the ideas are boring or that person has boring ideas and why those ideas are boring. at least be explicit if you are going to come in and dis something, come on man.

mh, all my friends has an interesting concept and is one of their best. you can't say losing my edge is a boring idea for a song.

further to my post up there that said

How Do You Sleep = Someone Not Great

i wonder to what extent the specifics of the goldsworthy-murphy relationship have soured to the degree that he was someone great who has gone to being someone who seems completely toxic.

asking for a friend...

i don't think someone great was about goldsworthy if that's what you're saying?

losing my edge is _half_ an idea and that’s why it’s good

maybe it’s stories I think are done less well, but “losing my edge” is “I’ve got a bag of names to drop but can’t keep up with the kids”
“All my friends” is basically the same theme only “we go out and listen to/play music but we’re getting old”
“Daft Punk is Playing at My House” is insanely literal and not my favorite but he still does the “kid” thing in it!

like the main lcd themes I like are “here is a song where we repeat some nonsense and do some build-up with the instruments” or “I’m old and kids are gonna eat my dinner”

there are some other good songs but Murphy really pulled a lot of things out with just those bits

Great record on first listen. I'm going to need to spend some more time with it, but I enjoyed this much more than I thought I would.

xxp "Someone Great" is about Murphy's therapist. according to Lizzy Goldman's book, it was written on the day he died.

here are some other good songs but Murphy really pulled a lot of things out with just those bits

I'm with james. This record is too self-important to be enjoyable maybe that's their intention a sort of meta band gping full circle and it'll all end up being brilliant in context but I dont care I just wanted to dance.